


You Killed A Cockatoo?!

by ajay_lotte



Series: The Yellow Car Initiative [3]
Category: Daredevil (Comics), Daredevil (TV), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Awesome Claire Temple, Awesome Karen Page, Bisexual Matt Murdock, Claire Temple is So Done, F/F, Gen, Genderfluid Loki (Marvel), Human Disaster Matt Murdock, Past Loki/Matt Murdock, Reporter Karen Page, Shopping Trip, Third Wheels, third wheeling, yellow car game
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-27
Updated: 2020-08-27
Packaged: 2021-03-06 20:41:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,057
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26145037
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ajay_lotte/pseuds/ajay_lotte
Summary: In which the Iron Man suit malfunctioned, Matt has no clothes, and Karen and Claire are dedicatedly out to get him.
Relationships: Karen Page/Claire Temple, Loki & Matt Murdock, Matt Murdock & Claire Temple, Matt Murdock & Karen Page, Phil Coulson & Matt Murdock
Series: The Yellow Car Initiative [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1883668
Comments: 7
Kudos: 226





	You Killed A Cockatoo?!

**Author's Note:**

> So, part 3 (can be read as a stand alone). Ngl, I enjoyed writing this too much.  
> Marvel owns all these characters and stuff, this is just a fanfiction for my own amusement because I suck, I'm bored, and had this idea watching Iron Fist the other night  
> Warnings: part of this brushes over Matt's depression, but it's really brief, like blink-and-you-miss-it brief  
> Pretty much  
> Hope it's a fun read, Lotte :)

Matt’s third wheeling…

“Oh, what about this tie?” Karen asks happily. Matt wants to make a blind joke.

“I think it’s too bright.” Claire gets there before him, answering with Karen with all sincerity. “Perhaps a slightly darker shade, to fit the brooding vigilante vibes.” Matt cocks his head to the side, listening to her moevements. Claire wonders if he ever gets neck strain.

“You’re right. And it’ll compliment the red glasses nicely.”

…he doesn’t like it.

“Karen…” he trails off, interrupted by Claire.

“Hey babe, what about this purple one?”

A few nights ago, Clint had come over to his apartment accompanied by a defeated Tony Stark. His suit malfunctioned. “This isn’t possible!” Had been one of the many phrases repeated during that night, along with multiple colourful ones. Tony was outraged.

Matt revelled in his frustration.

Because he’s a dick sometimes.

And although the three were able to put out the fire without alerting neighbours and the fire department, through tech stuff Matt doesn’t fully understand, the three heroes weren’t able to save much of Matt’s bedroom. Though, his dad’s boxing stuff was kept safe in the apparently fireproof chest, which went with minimal damage.

Tony is demanding to pay for most of the damages and has given a lengthy sum of money Matt’s positive he’s never owned which Daredevil is unable to transfer back from his Avengers account.

He’s not an Avenger.

Not that anyone bothers to remember.

“No purple, Clint will go insane.” Matt says.

“Who’s Clint?” Karen asks.

“Clint doesn’t know who you are.” Claire replies. “I’ve never met him, and I’m not sure who he is exactly. But I gave him my key to Matt’s apartment.” Matt makes another mental note to track down his various vigilante-owned apartment keys.

“Oh, I knew that.” Karen says, and moves on to look at more ties. Since the malfunctioned suit, Matt’s been borrowing clothes from Danny. Karen started to notice. The ill-fitting trainers were a giveaway, them slipping off Matt’s feet every ten minutes. Hence the shopping trip.

Claire needed some new jeans. Further hence the third wheeling.

“I think that’s enough ties, Karen.”

She considers this. “One more, something brighter than black or grey.”

“You said you’d already chosen red ones.”

“Dark red, Matt. We’ll just get you a bright red one! You never know, people might mistake you for Spiderman instead of Daredevil.”

Matt wishes Foggy were here so he could cry into his shoulder. Instead, Foggy is spending Saturday with his family. Matt’s normally dragged there, but today; Karen’s stolen him. He mourns the loss of Mrs. Nelson’s cooking. “Hello?” Claire says loudly and clicks her fingers by Matt’s ear. He jumps to attention.

“Rest in peace.” He mumbles, trailing behind the adorably-grossly clingy couple to the shirt section. Maybe they’re on a vendetta against Matt’s sensitive nose. He tries, honest to god tries, to turn it off.

It takes over an hour for the pair to be satisfied that he has a healthy selection of suits which both fit properly and suit him. And with random second opinions from suddenly awkward strangers and over the top shop assistants. Neither Karen nor Claire notice the wrongness of the situation, too caught up in their fantasy fashionista world.

Much to Matt’s horror, they don’t stop there. Next on the list is “ordinary human clothes”.

“All clothes are ordinary human clothes.” He argues. “Asides from clothes made for pets. According to Clint, they’re a thing. He made me help choose a raincoat for his dog. Nat says my choice was perfect. Though now I’m pretty sure it’s a neon colour. Laura sounded kind of distressed when Clint showed it to her.”

Karen and Claire don’t care for his argument or the colour of Lucky’s coat. Matt pouts as Karen leads him into a strongly scented shop. He sneezes. Three times.

All he gets is an old tissue for his struggle.  
It’s been in Karen’s bag for way too long, smelling of gunpowder and blood, as well as perfume and lipstick. It’s covered in light traces of sweat when her hand’s brushed against it, as well as contaminated with various old crumbs from food dropped into her bag. And on top of it all, there’s a thin layer of dust. He holds it by the corner, and after a second, decides he doesn’t have to accept the tissue.

“Karen, thank you for the tissue, but it tastes like pistachios and metal.” Karen’s quick to snatch it back. She shoves it in her pocket.

“No worries.” Her voice is slightly higher pitched. Claire snorts with laughter. “So, ordinary human clothes.”

“Sweatpants.” Claire says as an answer. “For when you’re doing that dying thing.”

“Good call.” Matt nods.

“And a black t-shirt. Multiple.” Claire figures. “And you used to have a grey one until I cut it off that one time.”

“I had a grey one?”

“Yeah.” Matt scowls. “Oh don’t look so pissy, it suited you just fine. Even if it was covered in sweat.” His scowl deepens.

“Ok- sweatpants and tees. Jeans?” Karen steps in.

“No.” Matt says whilst Claire says: “Yes.” He glares in her general direction, the action masked by his glasses. “Compromise for black jeans?”

“Comfy ones. Not ones that make my legs burn.” The couple deem that an appropriate request and set about choosing clothes and throwing them into Matt’s arms for him to try. He also gets a black sweater, one so incredibly soft that he refuses to take it off. It reminds him of the one he used to wear in college.

Though despite their efforts, the black jeans go unfound. “We could…”

“Let’s go there!” Karen points across to… a clothes shop. Matt can’t find the name.

“Ok.” Claire agrees, and takes Karen’s hand in hers. Matt trails behind them once again. They throw jeans after jeans into his arms until he has to re-stack everything and his dedicated annoyance to the scratchy material on his arm is enough to alter his perception of the world and make him trip over a fallen coat hanger.  
He doesn’t lose his balance and he doesn’t drop anything. Yet shop assistants apologise profusely, everybody gets stressed about the stray hanger, and the shop to goes into chaos.

Karen and Claire pay attention to none of it. “Do you think that’s enough?” Karen asks.

“Yes.” Matt replies, unheard.

“I think for now. We should see what they look like first.” He gets pushed into a changing room just like before, left with a multitude of black jeans. That’s assuming they’re all black, anyway.

Luckily for Matt, and sadly for Karen and Claire, he doesn’t have to try a lot of them on when showing the abrasive material causes rashes on his arms purely from carrying them. But the others he does try on are just as rough. The shop assistant outwardly hates them when they leave the shop empty handed.

Karen and Claire still don’t notice.

“Thanks. Sorry.” Matt can feel himself blushing. The same thing happens in three more shops until they’ve exhausted all the clothes places in this mall. “Thank you for coming with me.” Matt says as they walk back to the carpark where Claire’s parked her car.

“You say that like you think we’re done.” Claire remarks.  
Claire drives. Matt mopes in the back seat, muttering “yellow car” at a roundabout.

“Nope.” Claire responds, driving out of Hell’s Kitchen and takes them into Midtown. Matt knows people in Midtown.

People like Agent Phil Coulson.

“Murdock.” Coulson greets him. Matt forces his grown to be internal only. “What brings you into Midtown?”

“People who claim to be my friends.” He gestures to Claire and Karen who haven’t noticed him stop, busy talking about what kind of shops they should go to. It’s actually quite nice, listening to talk with nothing being of complete and utter importance. “I’m not here on business.”

Daredevil has been a go-to ‘spy’ for Clint and Nat for weeks, and for Coulson, somebody unknown and already highly over trained is the perfect person to take one of the jobs that desperately need filling. And after a painful amount of persuasion, Coulson finally got an identity and now Matt is Agent Matthew Murdock, not that anybody except Friday, Coulson and Maria know this.

But Matt is still not an Avenger.

“That is good to know. How are you balancing your two jobs?”

“Unpredictably well. You’d be surprised how many cases overlap.” Matt fiddles with the strap on his cane.

Coulson huffs a laugh. “Yes, your day job has given us a great strategic advantage, but nowhere near as much as one you have given us yourself.” Coulson smiles as the fidgeting slows. “If you’d like to get away for a while, we could always go for lunch? I’d like to get to know my…”

“Hey Matt, you should’ve said you were stopping. Not all of us are… who’s this?” Karen asks, appearing behind Matt.

“I’m Phil.”

“Please don’t call him Phil.” Matt begs. Coulson laughs.

“A lot of people are convinced my first name is Agent.”

Claire’s and Karen’s hearts speed up. “Agent?” Claire asks, arms folded. Matt likes to assume her eyebrow is raised. For dramatic effect.

To the side, he asks this to Karen. It isn’t.

“Agent Coulson; I’m a friend of Mr Murdock’s.” Matt’s grateful for not being called Agent. He isn’t grateful for the level heart. Coulson generally believe him to be a friend. Ok then. Friends with the new director of SHIELD. Which is also new.

“How’d you two meet?” Claire asks.

“Uhh,” Coulson hesitates. How does this guy have level 10 clearance?

“It’s complicated.” Matt tries, because everything with him is.

Karen nods. “Why don’t you join us? We’re trying to find Matt a pair of jeans.”

“It’s easier said than done.” Claire says.

Coulson laughs a little. “I’m not sure I…”

“Only if you’re not busy, Phil.” Karen tests the waters. Matt prods her foot with his cane. “Agent Coulson. Any help would be appreciated.”

“I don’t think…” Matt starts.

“I’d like that. If you’re sure you don’t mind.” Matt scowls.

Claire glances at Matt, though he doesn’t notice, and grins. “Not at all.” So with a newly acquired accomplice, the group head towards the shopping streets. “We didn’t drag you away from anything of importance, did we Agent?”

Coulson shakes his head. “No, I was just heading home is all. This is actually a pleasant surprise.” Claire scoffs. “Something I should be worried about?”

“Nope!” Karen says, all too happily. “And Matt, what’s with all the formalities?”

“Yeah, Matt?” Claire asks. Matt can feel Coulson’s amusement radiating off him like Bruce’s angry chemicals. “This is a good shop, let’s try in here for jeans.”

“So, Agent Coulson, we’re looking for black jeans only. Comfortable ones.”

“Ones which don’t need incinerating.” Matt adds, unhelpfully.

Claire and Karen loading up his arms quickly. One pair though, Matt jumps away from like Foggy did upon seeing that giant spider Matt had made a home for in the bathroom during college.

He falls back into a rack of clothes that he and Coulson catch quickly. “What the hell, Matt?”

“Not those ones.” He whispers.

“Matt, this is getting ridiculous. They’re brand new.” Claire comments, holding them up and presumably checking the labels.

“We’re not buying anything from here.” He says, demeanour changing. Coulson recognises it from work. He stands tall, posture straight, and voice low and absolute. Nothing like the timid response he just gave.

“Matt, the material feels nice though right? And Claire’s found some nice jeans, too.” Karen argues.

“The material is nice, but they were all produced in a sweatshop and the person making those jeans was injured whilst making them, and they haven’t managed to bleach all the blood out of the denim.”

The atmosphere has turned sombre, and Matt thinks he’s ruined the outing, until Claire speaks up. “We’ll leave the stuff. And never shop here again.”

“I’ll look into it, write an article for the Bugle.” Karen suggests. “You should have said something sooner, Matt.”

“I didn’t realise it was so bad until then.” He admits. “It’s hard to be sure.”

“So,” Claire starts, as the four leave the shop after getting contact details of the manager, “you know about the super senses.” She addresses Coulson.

“And the night job.” He nods. “I don’t mean to be rude, and I need you to know that I feel completely uncomfortable saying this, but I assume one of you is, and I quote, “Hottie-Mc. Burner-Phone”.” Claire laughs.

“That’d be me. I’m Claire, this is my girlfriend Karen.”

“Charm-Mc. Burner Phone?” Coulson tries, and Karen shakes her head.

“That’s actually Foggy. Mr. Nelson, our business partner.”

“Ah.”

“Foggy donned me Hottie-Mc. Burner phone before he knew about Matt’s night job.” Claire explains. “When his number was granted a place in the burner, obviously it was only in my right to name his contact. I entrust you to use our burner names whenever in presence of anyone else in the underworld.”

“Of course. Those pseudonyms are pretty infamous by now. Has Murdock told you about the race?” Karen and Claire look to Matt.

“We’re glaring at you so hard right now, Murdock.” He shrinks a little. Coulson smirks.

“I found out about it from Clint, but apparently heroes, vigilantes, villains and alike are all on the hunt to find your numbers first. I’ve had a shot at it myself, but it’s a truly misleading puzzle.”

Matt tilts his head down to the ground. Since he had Foggy’s phone number saved in his burner, he can’t deny having been paranoid about people finding his friends. One time, Matt dropped the phone, and luckily it was only Wade who found it. Though, the objectifying pseudonyms travelled quickly. In case of anything similar happening again, Red realised the only way of stopping people from stealing his phone to discover the mystery was to give them something so much more challenging.

Over months, he spent his time travelling around New York, planting a maze of clues and red herrings, never leaving anything tangible as such. A lot of clues rely on being enhanced like himself, or a tech whizz like Tony, or a mutant like Professor X. Everything is left for everyone, but nobody knows how many clues are out there, and neither does Matt anymore since he keeps adding more, and nobody knows what order they go in.

There is an answer, except the last digits of both numbers. They’re locked away in Asgardian safes, uncrackable by Midgardians and most other aliens, with life threatening injuries as a result of an incorrect attempt. The passcodes to the corresponding cases are the previously discovered correct variation of the phone numbers. But the combinations are limitless.

The only person to try and open them so far was Wade, because of his healing factor. But he was nowhere near and the injuries he sustained were enough to ward off any underworldly or enhanced individual trying to open the cases.

“Does everybody know Clint?” Karen ponders briefly, and that’s the bit she picked up on.

“How close did you get?” Claire asks, and this time Matt’s certain one of her eyebrows is raised. He asks Karen. It isn’t.

“That’s the thing. I don’t know. Even though I have cracked a fair few of the puzzles, I assume- I’m not sure, I cannot find a link to put the numbers in the correct order.” Matt smirks.

“Oh, don’t look so pleased with yourself Murdock.” Claire says. “And what gave you permission to scatter our numbers around New York?”

“It’s actually smart.” Coulson says. “Criminals wouldn’t think twice about stealing the burner and tracking your phones. For a lot of people in Murdock’s line of work, it would be surprisingly easy. This keeps everyone entertained, and whilst people aren’t bored, there’s less chance of you being murdered.”

Matt grins. “Wipe your face clean, dumbass.” Ok, it was his signature shit-eating grin.

For a second, Matt thinks the new bright red tie may be rubbing off on him. “My Spidey sense is tingling.” Nobody replies.

They all just blink.

“Matthew?” It’s an unfamiliar voice, but an incredibly familiar smell. “It’s so good to see you.”

“I’d like to be able to say the same.” His voice is dry. Yet it gets a laugh from the shapeshifting Asgardian approaching him.

“Just as funny as ever.” He beams. “You must introduce me to your friends.”

Matt wants the world to swallow him whole. “I’m Karen Page, this is my girlfriend, Claire.”

“Claire Temple.” They all shake hands.

“And I’m Phil, though I figure it best if you call me Coulson, even if it is my day off.” Matt glares at his friends, for all the good it does behind his glasses. “Though, I can’t help but get the funniest feeling we’ve met before.”

“You know, I get that feeling too. My name’s Lottie. Matthew and I met in college; it was certainly an adventurous time.”

“Uhh…” Karen hums.

“Not like that, Karen.” Matt says.

“Because you were such a good little Catholic boy.”

“You’re Catholic?!” Loki and Coulson exclaim. “And you went out with me?” Loki continues. Cue the shit-eating grin. “Well, at least now I know why you thought I was a hallucination.”

“We had a deal, Lottie.” He growls.

“Ooh, Devil voice. Scary.”

“Puny God.”

“Ok, Lottie? Nice to meet you, but we’re actually shopping for some jeans for Matt. Want to join us?”

“No.” Matt says, as Loki says: “yes.”

“Great!” Karen sings. It’s official. God hates him. “Hallucination, huh?” Karen asks carefully, silently asking Matt if he wants to take her arm for a change as Loki has a surprisingly good chat with Coulson. Considering he killed him.

Seeing as Loki is a shapeshifting, teleporting, unnecessary-in-Matt’s-case visual manipulator, whose only explanation was that he was a demi-God from Norse mythology, didn’t make a very good line of argument to counter his initial belief of the said Frost Giant being a hallucination. “I was just coming out of an episode at the time.” Which didn’t help. “There was a possibility I made Lottie up to help, though considering the amount or tricks and torment, I now realise how stupid I was. I was convinced he didn’t exist for a month until a professor asked him for ID.”

“He?”

“I’m gender-fluid.” Loki is now involved in this conversation, apparently. “And Matthew is making me sound like a complete ass.”

“You are a complete ass. You killed…” Matt shuts up. Nobody says anything.

“That cockatoo had it coming. Being all cheeky like that.”

“You killed a cockatoo?!” Claire exclaims.

“Yeah, but it’s fine now.”

“He.” Matt insists, because it’s polite.

“How is it fine now?” Claire continues her dominoes of shock. Though, she doesn’t sound disbelieving. So that’s something.

“Matthew’s fine now. Why shouldn’t a cockatoo?”

“Now you’re comparing me to a cockatoo.” Matt states and is satisfied with the audible gulp coming from the shapeshifter.

“Wait; you died Matt?! I feel like that should be on the list of things you tell us.” Karen states.

“I told Foggy. He made me go to group therapy.”

“I bet it was full of people.” She scoffs.

“Actually, that’s how we met.” Coulson speaks up. Matt beams.

Karen’s heart rate speeds up, and her hands start to clench. Angry Karen is a scary Karen. But Claire takes her hand and squeezes it. “Yellow car.” Karen says instead. She hits them all. Hard.

“Oh, my brother says this shop is a good one.” Loki says, and Matt sniffs the entrance curiously.

“Smells of watermelon. I haven’t been here before.”

“Oh, and now you’ve been to other shops in Midtown?” Matt shuts up. Claire snickers.

“I’m going to ignore you all and walk with Coulson now.” Matt tells them matter-of-fact-ly. He pointedly ignores the part of his brain that wants to remind him he’s choosing his boss over his friends. Though he could call them his work partner/secretary, nurse and ex. He’s not sure if that’s better or worse.

“Before we start,” Claire says, holding up a pair of jeans, “is there a morbid reason why we shouldn’t shop here and call the police?”

Matt cocks his head to the side. “No.”

“Is there any personal vendetta you have against the shop like about the chemicals they used when making them?” Matt hums, considering the alternatives to the ones he can smell.

“No.”

“Are you going to be deathly irritated by the material and neglect to tell us until after your arms are red and you’ve drove yourself mad not cutting them off?”

“No.”

“Then hold these.” After a few more pairs, Claire checks his arms. Satisfied, they continue, and it doesn’t take long for Loki to join in the fun, outwardly flirting with both Karen and Claire, and throwing jeans onto the ever-growing pile in Matt’s arms from left, right, and centre.

Coulson is a little more reserved, though he too starts adding to The Pile. Matt’s decided it needs capitals now. Like the Fisk Fiasco, Castle Case and FBI Farce. It’s just as catastrophic. The Pile Palaver. Or maybe just the Shopping Shamble. Cover the whole outing as one big catastrophic disaster. And he thought being framed for bombing the Kitchen was bad.

“Ok, Matt. Fashion show.”

“I really don’t feel comfortable with this.” Matt’s shoved behind the curtain. “I don’t need jeans.”

“Agent Coulson; you wear suits. Do you ever wear jeans?” Karen asks.

Coulson hums. “Yes, I do on occasion. Around the house it’s sometimes nice, holidays too. I can’t always rely on suits and hospital gowns.” Matt growls from behind the curtain and changes into the first pair, then the second, then the rest and it takes pairs of being too big, or uncomfortable, or scratchy, or “plain right hideous”, according to Karen (and his other friends agree, to which Matt quickly figures he has no vantage to dispute their assessments), before he finds a pair that are just right.

“These ones.” He steps out into the shop with a tone of finality.

“Matt, you’re not a teenage boy. Who put ripped jeans on the pile?”

“I did.” Claire says. “Thought it’d be funny.”

“But they feel nice.” The jeans remind him of the ones he used to wear as a kid, with soft fabric loose against his skin. They give him more freedom though, not restricting his movements or scratching his legs with every jostle.

“Excuse me, sorry for overhearing.” Ironic, Matt thinks. “But there are jeans made of the same material. It’s a faux denim, I think they were put back in the wrong place.” A shop assistant leads an ecstatic Claire and Karen away from the changing room, excited for finally finding a correct pair of jeans.

“So, not exactly how you were expecting to spend your day off?” Matt asks, offering Coulson a polite smile.  
He laughs. “No, but it has definitely been an… interesting experience. Your friends are nice.”

“Yes, very.” Loki says.

“Don’t ruin it.”

Karen and Claire return, hand in hand, holding a pair of jeans. “Murdock, appreciate our victorious expressions, because you are going to beg for these jeans.” He takes them with a huff.

Beg he does.

“Please Karen.” Matt whines, refusing to take the comfortable clothing off. He fiddles with the tag, letting the sharp plastic dig into his thumb. “We need a casual clothing day.” He rips off the tag to give to the shop assistant at the till. She gives Claire and Karen a look. They give her ‘help me’ eyes back. Matt senses none of it. “Karen, have I ever told you how great you are? And your coffee. And your investigative work.”

“Matt, we’re not having a casual clothing day.” The trio re-join Coulson and Loki outside the shop doorway. “It was nice to meet you both- there’s a club. The IKD (I Know Daredevil) club, or IDK for short because it’s a fun play on words when you’re drunk.” Matt groans when the pair both agree to come, leaving their personal phone numbers with Matt.

“Contact saved as Coulson.” His phone recites, SHIELD and Agent already taking up numbers. “Contact saved as Loki.” There’s a pause.

“You called me a cockatoo.”

Loki runs.


End file.
